In fact a number of mummies have been fopund to have red hair in addition to Ramses II including Seqenenre Tao of the 17th dynasty and Thuya (mother Queen Tiy) from the 18th dynasty. There are even some examples of blonde! Hold on before everyone gets in that dreaded debate over race of the ancient egyptians. I am not suggesting that the egyptians were or were not cauacasoid. It is now suspected that this color is due to the mummification process. There has been evidence of cortex keratin oxidation in ancient Egyptian hair presumed to be the result of the strong alkaline ontent in natron used.

That could be true, that the hair is dyed due to mummification; however, I don't think it is very likely. The way dying (or rather, bleaching) your hair works is that first it turns a dark orange to lighter, to yellow (or blonde) and finally white.

Mummification took relatively the same amount of time, varying from corpse to corpse, and of course royal mummies had stronger salts and longer, greater care taken into the process of mummification. Now, there are royal mummies that have hair of dark brown, black, red blonde and white. Personally, I don't think it is due to dying of the hair, as it would mean that all mummies would have at least a lighter shade of hair than black or dark brown.

In fact a number of mummies have been fopund to have red hair in addition to Ramses II including Seqenenre Tao of the 17th dynasty and Thuya (mother Queen Tiy) from the 18th dynasty. There are even some examples of blonde! Hold on before everyone gets in that dreaded debate over race of the ancient egyptians. I am not suggesting that the egyptians were or were not cauacasoid. It is now suspected that this color is due to the mummification process. There has been evidence of cortex keratin oxidation in ancient Egyptian hair presumed to be the result of the strong alkaline ontent in natron used.

this is true it could be from the mummification process but than how come all the mummies don't have this and some do through the ages and some don't plus those mummies you speak of they also seem to have straight hair .im not suggesting like what you had said if caucasian or not but it does add to the mystery that was ancient egypt and why we all love the ancient history of egypt so much

Hold on before everyone gets in that dreaded debate over race of the ancient egyptians. I am not suggesting that the egyptians were or were not cauacasoid. It is now suspected that this color is due to the mummification process. There has been evidence of cortex keratin oxidation in ancient Egyptian hair presumed to be the result of the strong alkaline ontent in natron used.

In the case of Ramses II, it has been more recently noted that the red hairs are right at the roots, so it's more likely that he in fact was a redhead. By the time Ramses was on the throne, Egypt was a cosmopolitan land with people moving to Egypt from all different lands. It's therefore hardly surprising that some rulers around and after this period were of foreign descent. Ramses II is believed to have Syrian origins.

Trying to classify the Egyptian race by the color of hair is stretching it a bit. Generally, a race CAN be determined more by color of hair, but every race has abnormalities. Ramses II was a natural redhead: There have been lighter colored hair, even blonds, found on mummies. Whether this is color of choice or through the mummification process is a moot point--they have been found!
Don't let this thread dissolve into a pointless argument about race.

Hold on before everyone gets in that dreaded debate over race of the ancient egyptians. I am not suggesting that the egyptians were or were not cauacasoid. It is now suspected that this color is due to the mummification process. There has been evidence of cortex keratin oxidation in ancient Egyptian hair presumed to be the result of the strong alkaline ontent in natron used.

In the case of Ramses II, it has been more recently noted that the red hairs are right at the roots, so it's more likely that he in fact was a redhead. By the time Ramses was on the throne, Egypt was a cosmopolitan land with people moving to Egypt from all different lands. It's therefore hardly surprising that some rulers around and after this period were of foreign descent. Ramses II is believed to have Syrian origins.

if he was in fact syrian that would make him caucasian for sure not negroid sub saharan like the wacko afrocentrics claim all the ancient egyptians out to be,the 25th dynasty was the only black dynasty in ancient egypt and they were really nubians.

That could be true, that the hair is dyed due to mummification; however, I don't think it is very likely. The way dying (or rather, bleaching) your hair works is that first it turns a dark orange to lighter, to yellow (or blonde) and finally white.

Mummification took relatively the same amount of time, varying from corpse to corpse, and of course royal mummies had stronger salts and longer, greater care taken into the process of mummification. Now, there are royal mummies that have hair of dark brown, black, red blonde and white. Personally, I don't think it is due to dying of the hair, as it would mean that all mummies would have at least a lighter shade of hair than black or dark brown.

I think it depended on how acidic the natron was, not on how careful they were mummifying. That is why many mummies have that fake orange bleached look, but the ones that have darker hair had less acidic natron.

Egyptian people really aren't black or white. We have to consider how many different races of people came together. Upper Egypt has darker skin, because of a more Nubian background, and Lower Egypt has that Hyksos and Asiatic influence, along with kings beginning to add Eastern wives to their harems. When Amunhoptep III married Gilukhipa, daughter of Shuttarna II, king of Mitanni, she arrived in Egypt with 317 ladies in waiting.

And we have to take into account that the Ancient Egyptians never considered themselves black. They considered Nubians black, but they always portrayed themselves with a middle skintone.

The only "black" statue I can think of is the Osirid statue of Mentuhotep. Of course, the black seems to be an attempt at trying to portray him with the Osiris skin tone; blue or green. During the beginning of middle kingdom, the art was still rough, and it had been nearly 200 years since the arts had flourished in the old kingdom, so the statues artistic style is not up to par with the art that was produced at the hights of the ancient Egyptian Civilization.

No, you do not judge their race by their hair color. You look at bone structure.
White skin on typical African bone structure makes for a very strange looking person. Likewise vice-versa.
Egyptian royals, like all royals liked to marry others of the same position.
Egypt was basicly a multi-cultural country for longer than anyone knows.
It does seem that most of the Pharoahs were light haired and light
skinned. Many of them had hooked noses.

Remember the Hyksos were white; they were the Israelites.
It is likely that very few of Egypts rulers were Nubian or other black African. It has been ruled by the Greeks, Persions, Romans etc.
The Ramses were likewise Israelite/jews.
Amenhotep III is said to be a mixed race, and he does look it, both in his statues and his mummy. At this time I am of the opinion that Thutmoses IV was not his father. There is o resemblance there at all.
More likely a large robust Nubian was his father
None of the Thutmoses or Amenhotemps are very robust. Escept Amenhotep II.

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